Throughout this series I’ve said that unless there is a spiritual awakening, America will face the judgment of God. In some ways, we are already experiencing His judgment in these very days. He doesn’t have to send some supernatural visitation from heaven to judge us. We are simply reaping the bitter fruit of six decades of pushing God off the public square in America.
When your world is falling apart and a foreign country is threatening to conquer your country, it would be easy to live by fear. But Habakkuk shows us that there is another way; we can live by faith. His prophecy begins with an “Oh, no! Things are awful!” And he ends with “Oh, yeah! God is in control!”
2012 Christmas program, featuring the Celebration Choir and Orchestra under the direction of Mike Parks.
God has blessed America, because, like Israel, we were established with a deep sense of honor and reverence for God. But also like Israel, we have turned away from God. The prophet Zephaniah tells us what happens to nations that forsake God. In this short but powerful prophecy, he first describes the judgment of God; then he describes the hope that people find when they seek God.
People have asked me what I thought about the election this past week, so here goes: I pledge to pray for President Obama and respect the office of President, because God’s word is clear that we should pray for those in authority over us. However, I believe America missed a good chance to put our nation back on track to God and to Biblical morality. But instead of stemming the flow of blood from the abortion clinics, instead of protecting the sanctity of marriage, we have thumbed our nose at God. As we stand at both a fiscal cliff and a moral cliff, America has voted. We’re moving forward. And when you’re on a cliff, forward is the only direction you should avoid.
Hosea’s marriage to Gomer was a living parable of God’s relationship with Israel and with any nation that wanders from Him. Hosea is preaching came from his own personal experience of love, pain, and redemption. He told the Israelites that, like an unfaithful wife, they were guilty of spiritual adultery. Hosea could say with passion and honesty, “I know how God feels, because I felt the same way. You have broken the heart of God who loves you!”
As I read the prophecy of Amos, I can’t help but notice the similarities between ancient Israel and modern America. It was a time of great prosperity for Israel, but it was also a time of great immorality. But in the midst of it all, they just didn’t really care. They were complacent. Do you care about the direction of our nation? Are you alarmed that our nation’s moral foundation has been cracking for the past few decades? The sad truth is many Christians don’t even care enough to vote. You should let your voice and your vote be heard.
Conservative estimates tell us there are a hundred million people today professing to be born again, evangelical Christians. Where’s our impact? Imagine a hundred million Jonahs walking around in a culture, in the marketplace, in the government, in the schools, in the health clubs, in the neighborhoods. A hundred million people filled with resurrection power as though alive from the dead. That’s what the world is waiting to see and that’s the hope for America today.
It is true that locusts of all kinds come and eat up things valuable to us. They may be literal insect locusts, or they may be the financial or emotional locusts that destroy our savings or our sanity. They may be the judicial or legislative locusts that strip away the leaves from the tree our founders planted. But whatever kind of locust you’ve faced in the past. God gives an amazing promise in Joel. He says, “I will restore to you the years the locusts have eaten.” (Joel 2:25)
The main truth we can glean from both the Major and Minor Prophets is that God not only deals with individuals, He also deals with nations. Edom is a long-forgotten nation, but Israel is in existence today and is in the news almost daily. As we examine the message of Obadiah, let’s consider God’s Word to America, and then God’s Word to me.
When we’re crucified with Christ, we’ll be like that thief on the cross. He longer cared about what people thought about him. They could have yelled that he was ugly and stupid, but it didn’t bother him, because he was crucified with Christ. He didn’t fear arousing the wrath of the Romans for talking to Jesus, because he was crucified with Christ.
There are some burdens we need to share, and some we need to bear alone. But we all have one burden in common. It’s the heaviest burden that we’ll ever carry: It’s the burden of GUILT we bear because we are sinners. That burden is too heavy for me to bear alone. It’s too heavy for us to share it together. There’s only One who can carry that burden, and He has already carried it to the cross.
The biggest mistake you can make about the Fruit of the Spirit is to think you can manufacture love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Fruit can’t be manufactured. You can’t manufacture Spiritual Fruit either. It comes supernaturally when there is a proper mix of the Life of the Son, the power of the Holy Spirit, and your willingness.
Is your life like a car and Jesus is a passenger? Jesus was in my life, but I had the steering wheel. I’d sometimes see a detour and flip on the blinker and Jesus would say, “Don’t go down that road!” I’d say, “Who’s driving? Me or you?” Then I’d always end up lost and stuck in the mud of my poor decisions. I’d say, “Jesus please give me directions to get back on the main road.” My life was a continual series of bad detours. But on that night I truly surrendered to Jesus as Lord, I said, “Jesus, let’s swap places. I want You to have the steering wheel.” At that moment I became the passenger and He became the driver. Through the years I’ve seen plenty of flashing billboards directing me to go down the wrong road, and I’ve said, “Hey, what about that? Let’s try that road!” And Jesus simply says in reply, “Who’s driving? Me or You?
Gentleness isn’t weakness; it’s strength under control. Gentleness means you don’t use strength to hurt those who are weaker. It’s true physically, and it’s true emotionally. If you’re ever in a confrontation where you could verbally or intellectually destroy the person who disagrees with you, gentleness prevents you from hurting them. Gentleness means you don’t get in someone’s face and yell at them. People are fragile; they need to be handled with care.
You have to move that “Our God is faithful!” understanding from your head to your heart. You have to TRUST that He is faithful. Sometimes when trouble and tragedy afflict us we wonder what God is doing. But these are the very times when you have to TRUST that God is faithful to keep His promises to us. He has a plan for your life—a plan to prosper you, not to hurt you; a plan to give you hope and a future.
We think we’re good because we compare ourselves to others. We look at our neighbors, our coworkers, and our friends and if we’re a little better than them, we feel we’re pretty good people. You’re using the wrong standard if you compare yourself to other people. God’s standard is perfect goodness and complete holiness. If you use the wrong standard, then all comparison is useless.
Presented by the Celebration Choir & Orchestra under the direction of Mike Parks, featuring special guest Adam Paul Williams
The kindest thing you can do for a person is to introduce them to Jesus. And sometimes the easiest way to do it is by performing some act of kindness to them in Jesus’ name. Kindness is an evangelistic tool. You may not know the four laws or the seven steps, but you can show kindness in Jesus’ name.
Sometimes Jesus calms the storms of life, but most often He calms our hearts in the midst of life’s storms. We all know that a hurricane is a devastating force of nature. But at the center of every hurricane there’s an eye, where it’s calm and peaceful. The sun is shining, the air is still, and even birds fly around in the eye of the storm. Peter was in the eye of the hurricane that night in prison. And when you know that God cares for you, you can be in the peaceful eye of the storm while all around you the storm rages.
When you wake up every morning, you have a choice. You can wallow in the ashes of the world, or choose the beauty that God offers. You can give in to mourning, or you can have the oil of joy covering you. Are you burdened down with a spirit of heaviness? You can choose to put on the garment of praise. Joy is a choice!
The apostle Paul lists fifteen different sins, but he concludes the list with the words, “and the like.” That means the list isn’t exhaustive: If you don’t find your pet sin listed, that doesn’t mean you get a pass. The fifteen different weeds of the flesh fall into four general categories. A comparison of the weeds of the flesh and the fruit of the Spirit.
I believe that when you come to Christ, God forgives every sin you’ve ever committed and every sin you’ll ever commit. So if I’m forgiven, then why should I run from sin? One word: Consequences. Forgiveness is God removing the penalty of my sin problem—eternity in hell. But as a Christian I still have to face the consequences of my sin in this life. Moses sinned against God by showing pride and disobedience. He was forgiven, and he’s in heaven, but he sinned, he suffered the consequence of never entering Canaan. King David sinned against God, and he was forgiven, and he’s in heaven how. But because of his sin, he suffered tragedy and heartache in his family.
How many of you have ever seen a falling star, raise your hand. Really? I doubt what you saw was a star. Our sun is a star, and stars don’t “fall.” What you saw was a piece of space junk, a meteor. It wasn’t a star falling. If you see a star falling, we’re in trouble. And if you think you saw a Christian who fell from salvation, chances are they weren’t a Christian in the first place.
When we live under the liberty of grace, we admit we are powerless to help ourselves. There’s a reason why that’s the first statement in the 12 steps of AA and in Celebrate Recovery. When a person is in bondage to an addiction, they will remain in chains as long as they try to help themselves. They think, “I can fix this. I can do better. I can live better.” But it’s only when they admit that they are powerless, that they begin the journey to wholeness, healing, and restoration. The same is true about the Christian life.
Isaac was born supernaturally—there’s no way a 90-year-old woman could give birth. The thought of that was laughable. It was a miracle birth that had to be the divine intervention of God. That’s what grace is. Grace is knowing that it is humanly impossible for me to be good enough for God, so instead God must intervene supernaturally at the cross to perform a miracle. Jesus became sin for me so that I may become the righteousness of God.
This planet is littered with the graves and tombs of millions of people—some are famous tombs, but the majority is obscure. The pyramids in Egypt are really tombs, the Taj Mahal in India is a mausoleum, and the Ming Dynasty emperors are buried in massive tombs, with each complex covering almost 100 acres. Go to the tombs of religious teachers and call roll: Mohammad? “Here.” Buddha? “Here.” Moses? “Here.” Confucius? “Here.” Jesus? (silence) Jesus? All we hear is the echo from an empty tomb. Even if you’re a skeptic, you’ve got to answer the question: What happened to the body of Jesus?
There are some Christians who believe you can lose your salvation. They think there is something a Christian can do that would cause them to longer be a child of God. We believe there’s nothing we can do to become a child of God, so there’s nothing you can do to lose that position. Once God has placed you into His family by a new birth, no one or nothing can cause you to lose your relationship with Him. You don’t have to work to keep your salvation; He is keeping you.
You might have grown up in a small family, or a large family. You might have come from a blended family or a broken family, but we all understand the meaning of the word, “family.” We were once slaves to sin, but now we’re siblings—we are brothers and sisters in Christ. You and I are spiritual siblings because we have the same Father.
Yes, we may have different colored skin. Yes, we might have different jobs, and positions of leadership. And yes, there are differences between men and women. But IN CHRIST these differences don’t define who we are. The only two categories that really matter in the world are: Are you IN CHRIST, or not? At the cross, Jesus destroyed all the made-made barriers of hostility.
We think the door to freedom and happiness can be picked open by our own efforts, when Jesus has already declared us to be free. You may be sweating and straining at the thoughts of facing a holy God. You may be locked up by your fear of the future, tormented by the fact that you can’t DO everything you think you should be doing for God. And meanwhile, through His grace, God has already unlocked the door to freedom.
How do you find time every day to submit to the leadership of the Spirit in our “hurry-up” world? There is value in God’s daily will for us, yet we do not trust or seek it.
Many times in today’s society, we don’t turn first to Jesus or lead others to do so. We must be committed to the truth of Scripture and necessity of faith in Christ and trust him with our problems and with our friends’ salvation.
It’s hard to trust God in hard times until we see that he redeems all he allows. In a hurting culture, when we meet needs in Jesus’ name, we earn the right to share his love.
In a skeptical culture, where we separate the spiritual and the secular, our lives must prove the reality of our faith by seeing the transforming purpose and power of God’s Kingdom. A discussion of how to be a Kingdom Christian in every dimension and influence of your life.
In a self-sufficient culture, God will matter to others if He matters to us. Find out how you can be filled with the Holy Spirit why we need it.
We’re surrounded by dead people who go to great lengths to look alive. And in some respects, they may look better than some of us. They can work out, and have six-pack abs, but unless they know Jesus, they’re dead. They can spend money and wear nicer clothes, and live in nicer houses, and drive in nicer cars, but unless Jesus has come into their hearts to give them life, they’re dead. Just like a cut-off Christmas tree.
Just as our bodies get tired, our souls can get weary as well. Just as our bodies can experience pain, so can our souls. It’s just a different kind of pain. And soul pain and exhaustion is harder to pinpoint and treat than physical problems. When there’s a problem with your body, you go to a doctor and he or she prescribes medication or performs surgery. But the pain and fatigue in your soul isn’t as easy to treat and some emotional pain is unavoidable.
In a 24-hour period your heart will beat more than 100,000 times. You have so many blood vessels that if they were all stretched out end-to-end they would wrap around the equator. Twice. So in an average day your blood travels 168,000 miles. You will move and use over 700 muscles, and generate 450 tons of energy. In an average day you will speak 4,800 words, if you are a man—slightly more for the ladies! Your body contains overs 10 trillion cells and each one is more complex and intricate than the New York City power grid. You really ARE fearfully and wonderfully made. To claim that you are a biological accident is about as likely as an explosion in a junkyard miraculously resulting in a perfect Boeing 747.
